Japan’s FlutterScape closes $177k seed round with Digital Garage
FlutterScape, the Tokyo-based social marketplace site, has closed a seed investment round worth 15 million yen (US$177,000) with JASDAQ-listed Digital Garage.
This is FlutterScape’s second investment this month. We broke the news earlier this month that it took US$100,000 from Japanese auctions aggregator Aucfan. The latest deal closed on 26 Aug.
Digital Garage is a pioneering Japanese web company. In the last few years it is most well-known as Twitter’s Japanese partner, recently signing Twitter co-founder Biz Stone to its advisory board.
Things have been moving quickly for FlutterScape, which exhibited at Echelon 2010 in June. Here’s our email interview with FlutterScape’s co-founder and chief executive Takehiro Kakiyama about the latest investment.
Who are you receiving funding from?
We received fund from Digital Garage Incubation.
How much funding? This is a seed round, correct?
From Digital Garage, we received ¥15 million (approx $177K) for our seed round and so far we raised a total of ¥25 million (approx. $300K).
What will the investor get in return?
A small portion of FlutterScape, Inc. equity.
What will you do with the money?
Working capital and marketing budget.
How did this deal come about? What’s the story leading up to it?
FlutterScape has sought and always will seek foreign network to be the world’s global company. Having netprice.com, one of the largest e-commerce websites in Japan, as our lead investor, I kindly asked Mr.Sato, CEO of netprice, for an introduction to Digital Garage. At the pitch, I found out that my first friend in Canada (I graduated from high school in Canada) turned out to be the son of Mr. Hayashi, CEO of Digital Garage group, and Mr. Hayashi, Mr. Sato and I were blown away by the fact that the world is so small. Then all the Digital Garage executives seated at the pitch really loved FlutterScape, in a meantime Digital Garage was seeking some startups from Japan that are global-minded pursuing the world class level of product. That’s how we came to click.
What other benefits do you hope to get out of this deal? Why did you choose to go with this investor?
I hope to leverage our business with their foreign network, prominent know-how and advice for startup, and social media expertise, including Twitter and Joi Ito’s insights.
When does the deal close?
August 26th, 2010.
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